A Note
About Updates:
Some of you may notice that this site is only sporatically
updated. There are several reasons. First, this site has
already succeeded in covering most of the topic. From this
point forward, we're after details and minor changes. Second,
between my family commitments, my job, prosphora stamp casting,
etc. it is hard for me to seek out new data and format it.
Third, some of you have sent me material that I have just not had
the time to post but will ASAP. Please be patient.
Fourth, I have had several people come forth with information with
is questionable in origin. My advice: please remember that I
am something of a researcher, so PLEASE cite sources.

Baking
Videos

Here are a few videos which I hope will help new bakers.Eventually, I will get around to
making more, but this should cover the basics for now.

By
Popular Demand!

Introduction

I n the
ancient Tradition of the Orthodox Church, Holy Mystery of Communion is
carried out through the mediums of wine and leavened bread. The bread is
specially baked for the purpose of communion, and it is called
"Prosphora" (meaning "that which is offered" in Greek.)This site is
devoted to the baking and use of Prosphora, the Holy Bread of the
ancient Orthodox Christian Tradition. We hope you will find this site
both informative and useful. Our intention is both to educate people on
the Tradition of prosphora as well as provide support to those involved
in the ministry of prosphora-baking.

Note
: all
information on this site is for public use, and we give permission
for the reproduction of all the materials presented here so long as
proper attribution is cited (i.e. you tell people that you got it
here!). However, we cannot accept responsibility for the accuracy
of off-site information (i.e. links), the reliability of off-site
material or untested contributions. If we can, we will note it.

A word to
the beginner...

Baking is an
art. That means, just because you followed the recipe doesn't mean
the bread always comes out the way you intended. Just like
singing or painting icons, it takes some practice and still there will
be mistakes. Go easy on yourself as you learn. Don't pour
holy water in the dough or make long prayers in front of your first
loaf, since you will more than likely be feeding it to the birds or
wishing you could put jam on it as you eat your mistakes. You are
not in the 5th century, so you don't bake bread daily. If you do
bake every day, then your prosphora probably comes out pretty
reliable. For those of us in this century, it takes years to
acquire the skill...and still we have problems. After all, yeast
is a living creature. Most of all, enjoy learning! It is the
Christian calling to grow in the life with God, and so try to grow as a
baker and continue developing your skills all your life. Learn
from your mistakes, glorify God for your successes and never cease to
relish the feel of well-kneaded dough!

Here are recipes for prosphora. Please email us
for clarification on local recipes only! As mentioned above,
we cannot vouch for off-site recipes.

Here are articles dealing with the "ins and outs"
of prosphora baking. As research materials come available, I will
post them here. As opposed to the recipe section, this area is
devoted to baking principles and techniques.

These are all articles or linked articles dealing
with the topic of prosphora and certain aspects of liturgics. Also
included are resources such as information dealing with prosphora or
supplies specifically dealing with prosphora baking.

These are all articles or linked articles dealing with the
traditions of the Church. Here you will find pious customs, festal
"holiday" recipes and other things not really about prosphora but
nonetheless interesting.

"For this is the symbolic
significance of unleavened bread, that you do not commit the old deeds of
wicked leaven. But you have understood all things in a carnal sense, and
you suppose it to be piety if you do such things, while your souls are
filled with deceit, and, in short, with every wickedness. Accordingly,
also, after the seven days of eating unleavened bread, God commanded them
to mingle new leaven , that is, the
performance of other works, and not the imitation of the old and evil
works."-St. Justin Martyr, > Dialog with
Trypho , ch. 14

"Lay aside, therefore, the
evil, the old, the sour leaven, and beye changed into the
new leaven, which is Jesus Christ."-St. Ignatius,
Magnesians 10

"The new law requires you
to keep perpetualsabbath, and you, because you are idle
for one day, suppose you arepious, not discerning why this
has been commanded you: and if you eatunleavened bread, you
say the will of God has been fulfilled. The Lord ourGod does
not take pleasure in such observances."-St. Justin,
Dialog 12

"And that the Savior
received first-fruits of those whom He was to save,
Pauldeclared when he said, 'And if the first-fruits be
holy, the lump is alsoholy,' teaching that the expression
'first-fruits' denoted that which isspiritual, but that 'the
lump' meant us, that is, the animal Church, thelump of which
they say He assumed, and blended it with Himself,inasmuch as
He is 'the leaven.'"-St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies
, Book 1, ch. 8,
para. 3

"The apostles ordained,
that 'we should not judge any one in respect to meat or drink, or in
regard to a feast day, or the new moons, or the sabbaths.' Whence then
these contentions? whence these schisms? We keep the feast, but in the
leaven of malice and wickedness, cutting in pieces the Church of
God; and we preserve
what belongs to its exterior, that we may cast away these better things,
faith and love. We have heard from the prophetic words that these feasts
and fasts are displeasing to the Lord."-St. Irenaeus,
Fragment 38

"Keep your nights of
watching in the middle of the days of unleavened bread. And when the Jews
are feasting,do you fast and wail over them, because on
the day of their feast they crucified Christ; and while they are lamenting
and eating unleavened bread in bitterness, do you
feast."-Constitutions of the Holy Apostles , Book 5, Section 3, para.
xvii

"Hear at least what Christ
saith to his disciples, 'The Kingdom of heaven is like unto a woman who
took leaven and hid it in three measures of meal.' So that the righteous
have the power of leaven, in order that they may transfer the wicked to
their own manner of conduct. But the righteous are few, for the leaven is
small. But the smallness in no way injures the lump, but that little
quantity converts the whole of the meal to itself by means of the power
inherent in it. So accordingly the power also of the righteous has its
force not in the magnitude of their number, but in the grace of the
Spirit. There were twelve Apostles. Dost thou see how little is the
leaven? The whole world was in unbelief. Dost thou see how great is
the lump? But those twelve turned the whole world to themselves. The
leaven and the lump had the same nature but not the same manner of
conduct. On this account he left the wicked in the midst of the good, that
since they are of the same nature as the righteous they may also become of
the same purpose.."-St.
John Chrysostom, Homily 3 - > On Demons , sect. 2

"And this is the reason why
He called you leaven: for leaven also does not leaven itself, but, little
though it is, it affects the whole lump however big it may be. So also do
ye: although ye are few in number, yet be ye many and powerful in faith,
and in zeal towards God. As then the leaven is not weak on account of its
littleness, but prevailsowing to its inherent heat, and
the force of its natural quality so ye also will be able to bring back a
far larger number than yourselves, if you will,to the same degree of zeal
as your own."-St.
John Chrysostom, > To Those Who Had Not
Attended the Assembly , sect. 2

"As this
piece of bread was scattered over the hills and then brought together and
made one, so let Thy Church be brought together from the ends of the earth
into Thy Kingdom. For Thine is the Glory and the Power through Jesus
Christ forever."-an anaphora prayer from the
Didache

"...And he
was in the midst, not as burning flesh, but as bread
baking..."-theMartyrdom of St. Polycarp

"Let me be
fodder for wild beasts, that is how I can get to God. I am God's wheat and
am being ground in the teeth of wild beasts to make a pure loaf for
Christ...I shall coax them to eat me up at once and not hold
off..."-St. Ignatius, Letter to the Romans

"...What
many bakers don't realize is that good wheat can make bad bread. The magic
of bread baking is in the manipulation and the fermentation. What has been
lost...is this method." -Lionel Poilâne

"Bread may not always
nourish us; but it always does us good, it even takes stiffness out of our
joints, and makes us supple and buoyant, when we knew not what ailed us,
to recognize any generosity in man or Nature, to share any unmixed and
heroic joy." -Henry David Thoreau, Walden (1854), in
The Writings of Henry David Thoreau , vol. 2, p. 182

"To eat bread is one thing;
to love the precepts of Christ and resolve to obey them is quite another."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson. Sermon given on September 9, 1832 at the
SecondChurch, Boston, Massachusetts. “The Lord’s Supper,”
Miscellanies (1883, repr. 1903)

"Oh, God! that bread should
be so dear, and flesh and blood so cheap!" -Thomas Hood, The
Song of the Shirt , st. 5 (1843)

"Science is analytical,
descriptive, informative. Man does not live by bread alone, but by science
he attempts to do so. Hence the deadliness of all that is purely
scientific." -Eric Gill, “Art,” Essays (1948)

Glory be to Jesus Christ our Lord and
our God!

Dedicated to

La Madonna di
Montevergine

Most Holy Mother, Pray
to God for us!

Symbol of the Ancient
Orthodox Christian Tradition of Southern
Italy

Many thanks to Hieromonk
Gabriele of Sacro Monastero di San Basilio il Grande (under Metropolitan
Gennadios of the Pat. of Constantinople) in Ravello, Italy, for providing
this icon for our site